Mobilising Communities

The Timing

The committment of the UK to carbon emissions reduction by decade. Note that if we started the reduction in 2010, this is a decrease of 2% per year. See the page Inform for more detail.

Facilitation

The CCRM is facilitated by the Cambridge Centre for Climate Change Mitigation Research in the Department of Land Economy of the University of Cambridge, in collaboration with an array of university partners.

Projects

The CCRM Project has two primary areas in which it seeks to support at-scale projects: low carbon demand management and a decarbonised energy supply. These project areas were selected because they cover the two most significant activities required for carbon reduction, and because (i) there was prior national groundwork laid to define the ideas and identify resource needs, (ii) their success would lead to significant reductions in carbon dioxide emissions, carbon sequestration and/or reduction of vulnerability to climate change impacts and (iii) there is broad support in the sectors to move forward on these and/or related projects.

Building Retrofit: This project addresses the demand side of energy and carbon in the UK, with a focus on the important role of buildings. Particular focus is on existing and historical buildings, as these will continue to make up more than 80% of the carbon dioxide emissions of the buildings sector even in 2050. The aim of the project is to bring about reductions in energy demand in these buildings on a scale and schedule consistent with the ambitious national targets shown in the bar chart to the left. The project is identifying candidate technologies and practices, followed by developing detailed plans for engineering, financing, roll-out of the changes, and monitoring of effectiveness, and from there to assembly of a project team for delivery.

Community Energy (Energy Independent Neighborhoods): This project addresses the supply side of carbon reduction, bringing less reliance of communities on high carbon energy sources while improving energy security. It builds on recommendations in the UK 2050 Energy Plan of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE). An important (adjunct) strategy in reducing carbon and creating more sustainable communities is to shift the production of energy from individual buildings on the one hand and from the national grid on the other, to a district or community level. The word "adjunct" is included here because reliance on a decarbonised national and perhaps even international grid remains an important part of the low carbon future). The ability of district schemes for power and/or heat to be financially viable and reduce carbon dioxide emissions depends heavily on load levelling. As with the Building Retrofit project, this project is identifying candidiate technologies of energy generation, followed by assessing the feasibility of these technologies for at-scale deployment, quantifying costs, analysing short and long-term benefits, forecasting demand for the energy over time, and removing financial and management hurdles.

The Sustainability of Projects

We assess sustainability of the CCRM Projects using a subset of the 68 National Indicators of Sustainability for the UK. While our primary interest is in how a project contributes to climate change mitigation, we also assess each project to ensure it carries a balance of the other 68 National Indicators of Sustainability for the UK, as might be required in obtaining planning permission. Learn more...